Shadowfires

Peake got behind the wheel, and Sharp sat in the passenger's seat, putting his attache case on his lap. He said, “If they take a cab, get close enough to read its plates, then fall way back. Then if we lose it, we can get a quick fix on its destination from the taxi company.”

Peake nodded.

Their car was half sheltered by the overhang and half exposed to the storm. Rain hammered only on Sharp's side, and only his windows were blurred by the sheeting water.

He opened the attache case and removed the two pistols whose registration numbers could be traced neither to him nor to the DSA. One of the silencers was fresh, the other too well used when they had pursued Shadway at Lake Arrowhead. He fitted the fresh one to a pistol, keeping that weapon for himself. He gave the other gun to Peake, who seemed to accept it with reluctance.

“Something wrong?” Sharp asked.

Peake said, “Well… sir… do you still want to kill Shadway?”

Sharp gave him a narrow look. “It isn't what I want, Jerry. Those are my orders: terminate him. Orders from authorities so high up the ladder that I sure as hell am not going to buck them.”

“But…”

“What is it?”

“If Verdad and Hagerstrom lead us to Shadway and Mrs. Leben, if they're right there, you can't terminate anyone in front of them. I mean, sir, those detectives won't keep their mouths shut. Not them.”

“I'm pretty sure I can make Verdad and Hagerstrom back off,” Sharp assured him. He pulled the clip out of the pistol to make sure it was fully loaded. “The bastards are supposed to stay out of this, and they know it. When I catch them red-handed in the middle of it, they're going to realize that their careers and pensions are in jeopardy. They'll back off. And when they're gone, we'll take out Shadway and the woman.”

“If they don't back off?”

“Then we take them out, too,” Sharp said. With the heel of his hand, he slammed the clip back into the pistol.

* * *

The refrigerator hummed noisily.

The damp air still smelled stale, with a hint of decay.

They hunched over the old kitchen table like two conspirators in one of those old war movies about the anti-Nazi underground in Europe. Rachael's thirty-two pistol lay on the cigarette-scarred Formica, within easy reach, though she did not really believe she would need it — at least not tonight.

Whitney Gavis had absorbed her story — in a condensed form — with remarkably little shock and without skepticism, which surprised her. He did not seem to be a gullible man. He would not believe just any crazy tale he was told. Yet he had believed her wild narrative. Maybe he trusted her implicitly because Benny loved her.

“Benny showed you pictures of me?” she had asked. And Whitney had said, “Yeah, kid, the last couple months, you're all he can talk about.” So she said, “Then he knew that what we had together was special, knew it before I did.” Whitney said, “No, he told me that you knew the relationship was special, too, but you were afraid to admit it just yet; he said you'd come around, and he was right.” She said, “If he showed you pictures of me, why didn't he show me pictures of you or at least talk about you, since you're his best friend?” And Whitney had said, “Benny and me are committed to each other, have been ever since Nam, as good as brothers, better than brothers, so we share everything. But until recently, you hadn't committed to him, kid, and until you did, he wasn't going to share everything with you. Don't hold that against him. It's Nam that made him that way.”

Vietnam was probably another reason that Whitney Gavis believed her incredible tale, even the part about being pursued by a mutant beast in the Mojave Desert. After a man had been through the madness of Vietnam, maybe nothing strained his credulity anymore.

Now Whitney said, “But you don't know for certain that those snakes killed him.”

“No,” Rachael admitted.

“If he came back from the dead after being hit by the truck, is it possible he could come back after dying of multiple snakebites?”

“Yes. I suppose so.”

“And if he doesn't stay dead, you can't be certain he'll just degenerate into something that'll remain out there on the desert, living pretty much an animal's existence.”

“No,” she said, “of course, I can't guarantee that, either.”

He frowned, and the scarred side of his otherwise handsome face puckered and creased as if it were paper.

Outside, the night was marked by ominous noises, though all were related to the storm: the fronds of a palm tree scraped against the roof; the motel sign, stirred by the wind, creaked on corroded hinges; a loose section of downspouting popped and rattled against its braces. Rachael listened for sounds that could not be explained by the wind and rain, heard none, but kept listening anyway.

Whitney said, “The really disturbing thing is that Eric must've overheard Benny telling you about this place.”

“Maybe,” Rachael said uneasily.

“Almost certainly, kid.”

“All right. But considering his appearance when I last saw him, he won't be able to just stand out along the road and hitch a ride. Besides, he seemed to be devolving mentally and emotionally, not just physically. I mean… Whitney, if you could've seen him with those snakes, you'd realize how unlikely it is that he'd have the mental capacity to find a path out of the desert and somehow get all the way here to Vegas.”

“Unlikely, but not impossible,” he said. “Nothing's impossible, kid. After I had my run-in with an antipersonnel mine in Nam, they told my family I couldn't possibly live. But I did. So they told me I couldn't possibly regain enough muscle control of my damaged face to speak without impairment. But I did. Hell, they had a whole list of things that were impossible — but none of them turned out to be. And I didn't have your husband's advantage — this genetic business.”

“If you can call it an advantage,” she said, remembering the hideous notched ridge of bone on Eric's forehead, the nascent horns, the inhuman eyes, the fierce hands…

“I should arrange other accommodations for you.”

“No,” she said quickly. “This is where Benny's expecting to find me. If I'm not here—”

“Don't sweat it, kid. He'll find you through me.”

“No. If he shows up, I want to be here.”

“But—”

“I want to be here,” she insisted sharply, determined not to be talked into another course of action. “As soon as he gets here, I want to… I have to… see him. I have to see him.”

Whitney Gavis studied her for a moment. He had a discomfitingly intense gaze. Finally he said, “God, you really love him, don't you?”

“Yes,” she said tremulously.

“I mean really love him.”

“Yes,” she repeated, trying to prevent her voice from cracking with emotion. “And I'm worried about him… so very worried.”

“He'll be all right. He's a survivor.”

“If anything happens to him—”

“Nothing will,” Whitney said. “But I guess there's not much danger in you staying here tonight, at least. Even if your husband… even if Eric gets to Vegas, it sounds as if he's going to have to stay out of sight and make a slow and careful journey of it. Probably won't arrive for a few days—”

“If ever.”

“—so we can wait until tomorrow to find another place for you. You can stay here and wait for Benny tonight. And he'll come. I know he will, Rachael.”

Tears shimmered in her eyes. Not trusting herself to speak, she merely nodded.

With the good grace not to remark upon her tears and the good sense not to try to comfort her, Whitney